


hollow, lonely spaces

by Grayson



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Bucky Barnes Nurture Porn, F/M, Feed him all the soup, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Give him all the blankets, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Shower him in all the love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-31
Updated: 2015-01-13
Packaged: 2018-02-15 13:35:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2230965
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Grayson/pseuds/Grayson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Bucky first noticed it on one of the Tony-mandated, Steve-enforced “bonding nights” for the Tower. As they all gathered in the lounge to catch himself and Steve up on some pop culture phenomenon or another, his eye caught on the flash of the thick red fleece blanket currently taking up residency on the back of his usual armchair."</p><p>Bucky doesn't remember everything yet about his time as Bucky Barnes or as the Winter Soldier. He remembers Steve, though, and he remembers the feeling of the biting and impenetrable chill of ice. Darcy does what she can to keep the cold at bay. Bucky returns the favor.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I do not claim ownership of the characters and universe contained herein. Nothing but the story is my own.

Bucky first noticed it on one of the Tony-mandated, Steve-enforced “bonding nights” for the Tower. As they all gathered in the lounge to catch himself and Steve up on some pop culture phenomenon or another, his eye caught on the flash of the thick red fleece blanket currently taking up residency on the back of his usual armchair. The seat with the worst view of the television but the best view of the exits, Bucky preferred to sit and idly watch the movie while remaining observant of the room’s occupants and the Tower in general. This change to his routine threw him for a moment, but he decided the blanket’s unusual and unprompted appearance didn’t outweigh the seat’s advantages, so he took his seat as the others scattered throughout the remaining couches and chairs.

Neither interested nor disinterested in these occasions, Bucky partook in movie nights primarily for Steve’s sake. Having a companion in the culture shock seemed to bolster Steve and give him even greater confidence in tackling the bombardment of new material they both faced. As Bucky recovered from his own troubles, it was important for him to have something markedly good like helping take care of Steve’s needs to balance out the waves of remorse that flooded him throughout the slow triggering of his HYDRA memories. His memory hadn't fully recovered yet, both in terms of his time as James “Bucky” Buchanan Barnes and his time as the Winter Soldier, but some points had remained constant in his memory and more still were coming back week by week. The importance of Steve, brought back as he recovered from the SHIELD vs. HYDRA blowout in D.C., had been consistent once it had been awoken in his consciousness.

Of similar consistency, however, was the sense memory of the ever-present feeling of cold. He had experienced it as the Soldier, an echo of his time on ice and a reminder of where he’d be returning. However, with his mission in mind, the feelings of full-body discomfort were ignored and overridden with focus on the Mission, the Objective, Strategies and Contingencies. Now left without that guiding force, overbearing though it was, Bucky can’t seem to shake the chill in his bones day in and day out. Generally discomfited with the luxury of the Tower, he indulges himself only with his pursuit to feel lastingly warm. In his initial months in the tower, his apartment remained warm and dry at all times, the temperature artificially elevated even in the midst of the summer’s heat. He took bath upon bath, submerging himself in warmth before finally being confronted with the cold once more as the water inevitably chilled. He still layers himself in shirts and jackets, struggling to keep his warmth as his own before the ice can steal it away once more. Thinking of the blanket strewn behind his back, Bucky wondered who had noticed the way he seeks to supplant the ice in his bones with warmth on his skin. He hadn’t exactly been subtle in his pursuits, he admitted, but he hadn’t thought he’d been particularly obvious, either. Observing his colleagues as they settled in for the night’s feature, he considered the viable candidates. Steve would make the most sense, as they had talked about it before, but he would opt for a more direct and private approach. Shifting his gaze further down the couch, Bucky considered Natasha as she chatted quietly with Clint. She was keenly observant on her own and knew him better than most. She had certainly caught the clues he hadn’t meant to leave but had made no effort to hide. However, even though she cared for him and his recovery, she was unlikely to offer him a solution to a problem he’d yet to seek help for from others. As he continued to observe and shift his gaze among the remaining occupants of the room in consideration, he noticed that one of the couch’s occupants kept trying to subtly flicker her gaze between him and the screen as the movie began to play. Taking the clue and opting not to act on it just yet, he casually turned his gaze to the screen as he considered the girl watching him.

Bucky hadn't paid Darcy Lewis much consideration when he’d first arrived in the Tower months ago. Lab assistant to Stark, Foster, and Banner, she had posed a significantly lower level of threat than the Tower’s supercharged and hypervigilant other occupants, who had remained wary until he’d proven himself through one test or another posing as a "casual encounter." Darcy, however, had greeted him with a level of nonchalance that he’d worried about in hindsight, once he’d found himself beginning to care for her. Her casual acceptance of someone who could have posed a threat to her was something he’d tried to address once, but she’d just cast him a skeptical sideways glance and said, “If you’d wanted to kill me, you’d have done it. Whether or not I offered you a friendly handshake wouldn’t have mattered. Your choosing to accept the handshake did.”

Darcy was another reason why he continued to attend "bonding nights," even if he had no particular vested interest in the activities themselves. Bucky had appreciated her from their first encounter and come to care for her more with each encounter since. He was charmed by the love shown in her ability to care for the residents of the Tower and the strength shown in her ability to take care of herself no matter what obstacle she faced. He had heard the story of her first encounter with Thor and been impressed with her quick and cutthroat decision to immediately act with her taser. Still, after learning that her showiest form of defense was also her only form of defense, he did what he could to encourage Natasha to approach her with an offer for self-defense lessons. Seeing Darcy enter the kitchen a few days later drenched in sweat but beaming from ear to ear as she regaled him with tales of her successes and failures had been enough to put a near-matching grin on his own face in response. As it was, he had given her a small smile and a nod of the head as he passed her a chilled water bottle from the fridge and asked about what she and Natasha had worked on.

They had built a solid friendship during his time in the Tower, even if his own feelings had shifted from friendship to affection to something he only dared think of as love just as he fell asleep longing for the warmth of her body tracing the lines of his own. Given the comfort of their friendship, Bucky was a little jolted by the subtlety of Darcy’s actions with the blanket. Darcy was a girl of actions and blunt statements. She was the sort to call him on his bullshit or abruptly lead him out of the building by the hand as she insisted that he could not continue to live in the same building as she did until he had tried a ‘real burrito’. Leaving a blanket on his chair as a quiet suggestion was not her style, and Bucky couldn’t figure out what the change meant. Deciding that further intel was needed, he kept his glance primarily on the screen while discreetly staying attuned to Darcy out of the corner of his eye. Watching her and the screen, he casually stretched an arm behind himself to grasp the blanket and drape it along his torso, leaving his arms and legs free to act if needed. As he finished shifting the blanket to rest comfortably, he noticed a soft, pleased smile stretch across Darcy’s face as she briefly took him in before firmly glancing back at the screen and resolutely avoiding looking his way again. Data collected for the time being but no closer to an explanation for the strange behavior, Bucky was drawn from further inspection by the slow spread of warmth emanating from his shoulders down to his upper thighs. Pleased with the feeling and wanting more, he cast a glance at his surroundings once more for potential threats before allowing himself a rest and tucking the blanket around his arms and legs to create a cocoon of warmth for himself.

Deeply content with the warmth circulating across and around him, Bucky returned to his contemplation of the blanket he was so thoroughly enjoying. It made sense that Darcy had noticed his need for warmth, as she had borne witness to his insistence on wearing layer upon layer before taking a trip out of the Tower once autumn hit. She could have attributed it to discomfort about his metal arm, as some of the others seemed to have falsely concluded, but she must have paid attention to other details to root out the true source of his behavior. He would have to ask her about that, if and when he decided to address the red fleece elephant in the room. Still, it was not her observation of the issue that puzzled him, nor was it her decision to address the issue at all. Darcy had a nurturing streak a mile wide when it came to people she cared for, and Bucky took all of her "mandatory fun" with him as a sign of her true consideration of him as hers. What he remained baffled by was why she would come at it in such a non-direct approach.

He continued to puzzle over the issue until he was snapped out of his thoughts by the movie’s end credits and the triggering of the lounge’s overhead lights. He quickly picked the blanket up and began to fold it in preparation for returning it to its initial spot on the back of his chair. Once he held the fleece square folded in his arms, however, he was hesitant to let it go. It smelled faintly of Darcy, and it retained the warmth it had been imbued with throughout its time spent cocooning him. He caught Darcy’s wince as he initially pushed through his reservations and went to return the blanket to the chair. With her apparent disappointment as his final push, and an additional piece of data for further consideration, Bucky changed paths and draped the blanket over his shoulder to carry it with him to his rooms.

He filed in alongside Darcy as the group made their way out of the lounge to their respective rooms. As they reached the doorway and were about to part ways, he readjusted the weight of the blanket on his shoulder and turned to look at her. He paused just outside the doorway and smiled softly to her, “Goodnight.”

Darcy watched the movement of his shoulder as he hoisted the blanket up. She offered a surprisingly shy smile in return and said, “Sweet dreams,” before turning and continuing to her own rooms for the night.

As Bucky went to bed that night, draped in the warmth of Darcy’s blanket, he felt himself once again tiptoeing around the idea of love and wondering if that and Darcy’s softly spoken, “Sweet dreams,” were the real reason for the warmth he felt as he slept through the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi, everyone! Thanks for taking the time to give this a read. I appreciate every view, kudos, bookmark, and comment that this work receives. It means so much to me (and also works remarkably well at guilting me out of my self-consciousness induced writer's block). Seriously, thank you.
> 
> Title comes from the graphic novel "Blankets" by Craig Thompson:  
> "Pressed against her I can hear eternity -- hollow, lonely spaces and currents that churn ceaselessly, and the fallen snow welcomes the falling snow with a whispered "Hush"."


	2. Chapter 2

A few mornings after taking the first blanket to his apartment, Bucky noticed a fresh wave of blankets that began appearing in its stead. First, he caught sight of a new blanket in the former one’s place along the back of his chair in the lounge. As he moved from the lounge to the attached kitchen, he noticed another, smaller blanket tucked into a cubby in the island. Later in the day, when he paid Darcy a visit in her labs, he noticed a soft, if aggressively bright, blanket draped up beside Darcy’s jacket and the scientists’ lab coats.

He and Darcy had continued their friendship as usual after their brief interlude on movie night, and Bucky had spent the past few days and nights convincing himself not to read too closely into the information he’d gathered from that night. He’d dismissed her continuous glances in his direction throughout that night as nervousness about overstepping her bounds in giving him the blanket. Her waiting to see him before they both left for the night was a way of checking in and being sure she hadn’t altered their friendship from the easy, comfortable place they’d found for it. The way in which she bid him goodnight, shy in his presence for the first time he could remember, must have simply been a sign of her tiredness and the relief from his not taking offence at the gift.

Now, though, confronted with these new blankets and Darcy’s nervous glances once more, Bucky wasn’t sure his assessments stood up. He had entered the lab with the intention of keeping Darcy company until they could take a lunch break together, and she was working dutifully organizing data at a tabletop in the lab. The garish blanket next to the entryway caught his eye immediately, both for its near-toxic shade of lime green and its general abnormality for the lab environment. Upon his entry to the lab, Darcy’s focus shifted from her work to him. She glanced up at him, gracing him with a wide smile. Seeing his attention drawn by the blanket, she pulled her lip between her teeth and glanced between him and the blanket before returning her attention to him. Offering a slightly more hesitant smile his way as Bucky’s attention continued to be diverted between her and the green monstrosity hung upon the coatrack, Darcy nudged the stool alongside hers out from under the tabletop and returned to her work.

Hesitating for another moment in the doorway, Bucky risked a glance at the blanket and around the lab at Jane, Tony, and Bruce immersed in their work before deciding the comfort of warmth overwhelmed the discomfort of their gazes and remarks. He snatched the blanket up and settled himself in alongside Darcy as she worked. Darcy looked up at him mid-penstroke and smiled, tapping the space bar on her computer to send music throughout their space in the lab.

Bucky spun on the stool, pressing the countertop to his back and allowing himself a line of sight to the rest of the lab. With the warmth of the blanket wrapped around him, Bucky was content to wait with Darcy as company until she was finished working.

* * *

 

Bucky had every intention of spending the next day organizing what he had learned Darcy’s odd behavior and formulating a plan of action from there. However, before he was able to do so, he was responding alongside the team to an alert from JARVIS that sent them on an overnight mission abroad to investigate an on-the-rise splinter cell of HYDRA located in Eastern Europe. By the time they came back days later, dirty, jetlagged, and not much better off on intel than they had been going into the mission, everyone had reached their limits and retreated to their rooms to crash. Fortunately for Bucky, this meant the return to the comfort of his room after the subpar accommodations that came with living in stealth to provide surveillance support for the team.

He stripped his gear as he wandered from his apartment entrance towards the bathroom for a shower. After days in an uninsulated barn bordering the HYDRA cell’s property, Bucky’s apartment felt downright balmy in comparison. Fresh from his shower, he heaved a tired, satisfied sigh as he reached the bedroom and an even greater level of comfort. Donning a fresh pair of sweatpants, he starfished out along his bed, face pressed deeply into Darcy’s fleece blanket. Enveloped in the warmth of the room and the barest lingering of Darcy’s scent, he begrudgingly moved his arms to tuck the ends up and around himself, remaining belly-down and leaving his face pressed against the firm warmth of the blanket-covered mattress. Slipping into a deep doze, Bucky let the warmth envelope him as the sleep soothed away the majority of aches and pains resulting from the mission.

By the time he awoke and decided to go to the kitchen to make up for all the meals he had slept through, it was well past any waking hour for a normal person, and yet he found himself unsurprised that the entire team was already gathered in various states of wakefulness in the kitchen and lounge. Steve and Clint sat across each other at the table playing a game of gin rummy, Natasha sat between them and observed the game with still-tired eyes. Tony was in the corner, his surprisingly calm chatter with Bruce a sign of how drained even he was. Thor was laid out along the entirety of the largest couch, Jane surprisingly not draped along his torso as she often was upon his initial return. Curious, Bucky looked past the lounge into the kitchen proper, spotting Jane and Darcy maneuvering throughout the cooking space. Jane’s eyes stayed glued on the toaster oven, waiting for what Bucky could only assume was a load of warmed pastries for herself and Thor. Darcy, meanwhile, appeared to be dividing her attention between preparing an army’s worth of takeout in the microwave and stirring something simmering on the stovetop. Bucky moved closer, wondering what it was she was putting together. She startled for a moment as he came to stand behind her, before turning to look at him and offering a tired but warm smile. Her eyes weren’t quite as sharp as usual and she moved with a sluggishness that, if her pajamas hadn’t been clue enough already, suggested she had woken up specifically to address the team’s inevitable craving for a late night snack.

In his months recovering in the Tower before being approved for missions with the team, Bucky had often contributed to Darcy’s efforts to provide the team with reheated feasts of their favorite takeout as a treat for their homecoming and a way of addressing supersoldier and Asgardian appetites at such a late hour. He knew it was a way for Darcy to show her love and support of the team while also keeping busy to keep the nerves at bay while they recuperated. Since joining the team a month prior, Bucky had yet to be on a mission long enough to warrant a “homecoming,” and it was odd to be on the receiving end of the ritual for once. He couldn’t help but wonder if Darcy had something in mind for him. The snatch of downtime he’d spent surrounded by the puzzling blanket imbued with a trace of Darcy’s scent had only reawakened his curiosity about her behavior before he’d been called out on the mission.

Darcy shooed him away from her work space with a chiding sound and a few firm shoves. Bucky acquiesced and sat at the kitchen island, content to watch her work through her homecoming routine as he had before joining the team. Darcy hauled a load of Chinese and Thai from the microwave before popping in a plate of nachos. She recollected the takeout containers, skillfully balancing them in a precarious but careful order in her arms. Pausing in front of Bruce and Tony, each man looked up as she cleared her throat and they unloaded her of her bounty, pleased to dig in. They offered smiles with mouths still packed with noodles, and Darcy offered a small smile in return before making her way back to the kitchen. The microwave sounded as she approached, and she pulled the plate out, sprinkling half with extra jalapenos and half with guacamole before carefully placing it on the table between Clint and Steve. Clint moved his cards to one hand and gladly helped himself to a melted wedge of chips and cheese. Steve, a little more mannered but no less indulgent, traded his hand of cards out for a stack of napkins and dug in. Darcy returned to stir the pot on the stove once more, taking a sample taste from her spoon and adding a few herbs gathered alongside the range. Pleased with the adjustment, she turned the stove to low and placed a lid upon the pot. That done, she collected a final plate filled with macarons from a nearby bakery and placed them next to Natasha’s wrist. Natasha grazed her fingers along Darcy’s in a gesture of thanks, a trace of a kind smile on her lips. Darcy’s eyes glowed with warmth at the gesture, and she drew away to survey the room and confirm the success of her work. Satisfied with the pleasant hum of chatter filling the room, interspersed with little sighs (or in Clint’s case some borderline-indecent groans) that came from settling back in to a warm meal among friends after time away, Darcy came to take up a seat next to Bucky at the island.

Bucky watched Darcy’s rounds with a pleased amusement. One of the things that first drew him to Darcy was how she could take care of herself, instantly attracted to the way she’d take a stand when Tony’s attitude got ahead of him and nearly stepped all over Darcy in the process. She’d had no patience for it, though, and she gave just as good as she got. Bucky hadn’t been able to get over the glow in her cheeks as she’d talked Tony down, nor could he forget her particularly evocative insults. Still, Bucky didn’t really feel his feet go out from under him until he’d had a chance to see how devoted Darcy became in taking care of others. She’d taken him under her wing in his most difficult of moments and called him hers, her unconditional forgiveness for his past sins a balm when the rest of him felt like one giant exposed nerve. Watching Darcy take care of the team, take care of the people she considered her own, warmed Bucky like one of the many blankets Darcy had taken to sending his way. Still, when she finished her rounds with a satisfied smile, he couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed to have been left out of the affair. He hadn’t wanted to presume she would do anything for his sake, and he certainly wouldn’t want to put her out or make her work hard on his behalf, but he would have thought she’d at least order an extra serving of crab wontons on his behalf. When she came to sit beside him, Bucky was torn with the surprising disappointment of not receiving her care and the quiet buzz of electrical excitement he got when she was near.

Darcy smiled to him as she settled in to her spot, and Bucky flashed a hesitant smile of his own in response. He still wasn’t sure what to do about her considerate gestures, since he still wasn’t sure what they’d meant. Were they like the meals she’d put together for his teammates, something to show she cared? Although, even that piece of information got complicated, due to his exclusion from the gesture. Or, were the blankets meant to be something more? Bucky knew she was observant about the whole team’s needs, so he couldn’t guarantee that her noticing his tendency to be cold was anything more than her standard level of observation and care. Still, she was never shy with those sorts of gestures before. She didn’t become hesitant with Bruce as she brought him a cup of tea on a stressful day, and she didn’t shyly lower her gaze as she loaned Steve yet another book that she was correct in thinking he’d adore. The pieces didn’t make sense for the Darcy that Bucky knew, which he knew meant he was missing some keystone piece that brought it all together. Deciding to sweep this analysis to the side for now and enjoy his time with Darcy after days away, Bucky turned on his stool to more fully face her.

“So, about done with your kitchenly duties?” He said.

“Mmm, just about,” she said, the trace of a smirk on her face.

“You sure did get an awful lot done in one night. Hope you weren’t too lost without your favorite sous chef,” he winked at her, drawing on some of the charm he'd had such a knack for before the war. He decided to file away the way she bit her lip and glanced down at that for later.

“Well, it wasn’t quite the same without those biceps of yours to do the heavy lifting, but I think I managed alright,” she smiled, casting a glance at the continued contentment of the team as they enjoyed the food she'd put together for them all.

“You did more than alright, Darce, just like you always do. I can only imagine the chaos that’d ensue if we all came crashing in here for food post-mission. The place would be a wreck. There might not even be a fridge left by the time we all blew through here.”

“I guess we’re both good at preventing crises, then. Thor told me about the way you spotted the undercover HYDRA goons before they got the jump on the team. They were lucky to have you out there.” She smiled, but there was a tightness to it that made Bucky’s stomach tighten in response.

“Something tells me that’s not quite all that's going on in that pretty head of yours, doll.”

“I just… I don’t like having to worry about you out there. It’s hard enough with the team, God knows what I’d do if something happened to one of them, but if you…” She cast her gaze away, and Bucky reached over and placed a comforting hand on her knee, rubbing in small circles. “I haven’t had to worry about you like that before. I didn’t like it,” she finally finishes, returning her gaze to his.

Bucky squeezed her knee in reassurance, grazing his thumb along its edge as he told her, “You don’t have to worry about me, Darce. I know what I’m doing, and when I don’t, I’ve got a hell of a team out there with me that does.”

Her gaze got a little firm, and he caught a glimpse of the pistol that stood up to Tony who had first captured his affections.

“Just because I don’t have to worry doesn’t mean I won’t, Bucky.”

“Aw, I know that, doll. You’re free to worry if you please. I’m just saying not to stir yourself up and cause yourself any trouble over me.”

Now, Bucky was certainly being faced with the spitfire he’d seen in Tony’s workshop months back. Darcy’s eyes flared with a blaze of passion, and Bucky was content to let himself burn in it.

“Bucky Barnes, caring about you is not some hardship or difficulty, and I won't let you think that it is. You deserve to be cared for, and I may not be the one you want doing it, but that damn well isn’t going to stop me from caring. Now, I’m not interested in hearing you talk about yourself like that anymore and your soup’s got to be ready right now, so let’s just drop it, okay?”

“Darce, I’m not trying to make you mad. I’m just saying… Wait, my soup? What soup?”

She gave him a look like she was trying to figure out just how many brain cells he’d lost while he was away, and he squirmed a little sheepishly for it.

“You didn’t honestly think I didn’t have something for you, too, did you? Seriously, even if your opinion of yourself can be insufferably low sometimes, have a little faith. I couldn’t forget about you like that.”

She placed a hand on his shoulder to try and convince him of the sincerity behind her statement, then she hopped off the stool and made her way to the large pot on the stove. Removing the lid and giving it a few final stirs, she took a taste from the spoon and, satisfied with the flavor, turned the burner off. Grabbing the ladle from its place by the herbs, Darcy scooped several large, steaming ladlefulls into a bowl and placed it and a spoon in front of Bucky. He startled from the daze he’d fallen into after realizing he’d jumped to the wrong conclusions.

“Alright, soldier. Eat up. You’ve earned it.”

The smell from the soup wafted up to Bucky’s nose and his mouth watered just from the savory scent of it. His stomach gave a rumbling growl, and Darcy stifled a giggle behind her hand, waiting to be sure her offering didn't miss the mark.

Bucky brought a spoonful of the soup to his mouth and moaned at the taste. He couldn’t imagine how much time Darcy had spent getting it to taste so good. The flavor was deep and rich, nothing like the homemade soups he and Steve had had back when money was tight, and not even quite like the ones he’d had in cans since he’d been brought back. The warmth of it filled him from the inside out, and a full-body comfort swept over him from head to toe with each spoonful. He cleared the bowl of its contents in minutes, not pausing a second for it to cool, simply drinking down the rich flavor and soothing warmth as quick as he could while still taking his chance to savor its layers of flavor. Bucky set the empty bowl down with a sigh, half pleased with the delicious soup and half sad to see it gone. Chuckling a little at the beginning of a pout Bucky aimed at the empty bowl, Darcy took it and filled it with more soup from the pot, setting it in the microwave to reheat. Bucky watched her as she took care of the soup, basking in the warmth from the previous bowl and the warmth that came with her care for him.

Darcy set the fresh bowl of soup in front of him, and he smiled up at her gratefully. A flash of determination cast upon her features, before her face fell back in to the caring smile she’d given him when she’d first seen him in the kitchen that night. Unsure what the change meant but unwilling to process it all just yet, Bucky lost himself in the warmth of the second bowl of soup, just as delicious as the first. He came to understand the look, he thought, when a few spoonfuls in he felt Darcy’s chest pressed along his side and the warm pressure of her lips pressing a sweet kiss along his temple.

“I care about you, Bucky. You may doubt a lot of things, but don’t ever doubt that,” she said, pulling away from him and offering him one final smile before walking over to join the now-upright Jane and Thor on the couch in the main lounge.

Bucky sat, stunned, the warmth from the soup growing into a roaring fire from the spark ignited by Darcy’s chaste expression of affection. His soup grew cold as he sat there, but he felt warmer than ever, starting with the lip-shaped blaze burning bright along his temple.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi, everyone! Thanks for taking the time to give this a read. I appreciate every view, kudos, bookmark, and comment that this work receives. It means so much to me (and also works remarkably well at guilting me out of my self-consciousness induced writer's block). Seriously, thank you.
> 
> Title comes from the graphic novel "Blankets" by Craig Thompson:  
> "Pressed against her I can hear eternity -- hollow, lonely spaces and currents that churn ceaselessly, and the fallen snow welcomes the falling snow with a whispered "Hush"."


End file.
